Online chat: 'He's not who I thought he was'

Woman who claims to have engaged in chats tells him to get help

Associated Press

Associated Press

Updated 11:07 am, Friday, July 26, 2013

Anthony Weiner, New York mayoral candidate, speaks during a news conference, Thursday, July 25, 2013, in New York. Weiner introduced his proposal for a "non profit czar" should he become mayor, but a new poll suggests his new sexting scandal is taking a toll on his mayoral prospects. City Council Speaker Christine Quinn leads in the Democratic primary race 25 percent to Weiner's 16 percent. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews) ORG XMIT: NYBM110

Anthony Weiner said Thursday that he'd traded racy messages with as many as three women since similar sexting forced him out of Congress.

Facing a third day of renewed queries and criticism of his conduct as he continued campaigning, the married Democrat also said he supposed he'd had sexually charged exchanges with a total of six to 10 women; he'd previously capped that number at six.

Weiner, the former congressman who resigned in 2011 after the first batch of sexts surfaced, is running for New York mayor and had been near the top of most polls of the Democratic primary race until the latest furor over his behavior began this week when the gossip website The Dirty posted explicit messages that a woman said she and Weiner sent each other starting in July 2012.

The scandal got seamier Thursday when the site posted an unredacted crotch shot that it said Weiner sent to a woman last year.

When reporters attempted to pin down the evasive Weiner as to the number of women with whom he had exchanged illicit messages, he delivered a rambling response before settling on "six to 10, I suppose." His campaign later clarified that of that total, Weiner corresponded with three of them after leaving office.

Weiner said he was still "working with people" to get help dealing with his penchant for X-rated online flirting, but he disputed that it's an addiction.

"I don't believe that it is. The people that I am working with don't believe that it is," he told reporters.

"The point is that it's behind me," he said. "I have worked through these things."

The woman who claims to have engaged in the online sex chats with Weiner, 23-year-old Sydney Leathers from Mount Carmel, Ill., and Princeton, Ind., confirmed her identity Thursday and told "Inside Edition" that Weiner disgusted her.

"He's not who I thought he was," she told the show.

She said Weiner told her that he loved her and she reciprocated. Asked what advice she would give the embattled mayoral candidate, she said, "Stop lying, stop embarrassing his wife and get help."